


It's Easier Than Besting Alien Giraffes

by Scribe



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-30
Updated: 2009-12-30
Packaged: 2017-10-05 12:46:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/41860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scribe/pseuds/Scribe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Christmas present for Kat, who requested something about the Doctor's glasses. Pre-Ten/Rose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Easier Than Besting Alien Giraffes

"Here we are, then!" declared the Doctor, skidding to a stop in a low-ceilinged, circular room that looked more or less like the others they'd been running in and out of for the past five minutes. He tore a panel out of the floor, winced at the mess of wires revealed, and pulled out his glasses. "If I can just add a few things to that little atmospheric shield they were using to extend the growing season, it'll bounce the gasses right off without them ever knowing they were in danger." He flopped down on his stomach and began prodding things with the sonic screwdriver.

"Can I help?" asked Rose, hovering by the doorway.

"No. Yes! In that cabinet there," he jerked his head at it, "there'll be a little red pointy thing. Looks a bit like a staple remover. Bring that over."

It was easy enough to find, although Rose thought the staple remover analogy was stretching it a bit. She handed it to him and then stood back again, unsure.

"Doctor?"

"Mm?"

"Sorry, do you need to concentrate?"

"No, doesn't take much thinking, just fiddly work. What is it?"

"What happens if you can't boost it in time?"

"It won't affect us at all, if that's what you're worried about. We can get in the TARDIS and fly right off to another adventure."

That was practically an answer in and of itself, but she wasn't in the mood for his evasions.

"And the A'oene?"

"They'll..." he took a deep breath, staring resolutely at the knot into which he was inserting the pointy thing. "The gas will suffocate them. Quick death, but not exactly painless." He tossed the pointy thing away, rolled his shoulders and delved down into the wires again. "Any other questions?"

"Your glasses," Rose blurted out. She hadn't exactly intended to ask, but neither did she want to dwell on the fate of the A'oene when there wasn't anything she could do about it.

"My glasses?"

"Yeah. Why glasses? Can't you do some Time Lord trick and fix your eyes or something?"

"Oh. Well, I could, yes. I have them because of you, actually."

"Me?"

"Mm. That time on ZaAad II before I regenerated."

"Sorry, which was that again?"

"We got thrown in prison-"

"Doesn't really narrow it down-"

"-Because you were flirting with the crown prince, remember?"

She thought for a moment. "Oh! With the grey fur and the...the fingers."

"That's the one. We had to sit in jail for two whole days and you weren't the least bit repentant. You said it was my job to tell you if we were visiting a culture where putting a hand on someone's knee could be considered an assassination threat because of the thigh glands or whatever, and I said-" she could almost hear it in his old accent, her memory in time with the new Doctor's speech- "I said maybe you shouldn't flirt with everything vaguely resembling a human male teenager and we wouldn't get into trouble like this, and you said that you couldn't help it, he rescued you from being eaten by that giraffe-thing and he was so nice and besides, he had glasses, and you never could resist boys with glasses."

Rose stared, genuinely at a loss for a moment. "You mean you have glasses, this you, because I told the last you that they were cute?"

His answer was cut off by a sharp bell tone and the side panels of the room lighting up a bright turquoise. The Doctor sprang to his feet, grinning ear to ear.

"I," he said solemnly, "am a genius. Have I mentioned that?"

Then the sirens went off.

They were lower pitched than any sirens Rose had ever heard, but they were definitely, unmistakably sirens. She raised her eyebrows at him.

"Oh. Er. You know the part where I said the A'oene would never know we were here? I may have messed that part up. Just a tiny bit."

Shouts echoed down the corridor, followed by the sound of booted, running feet. The Doctor pocketed the sonic screwdriver, kicked the floor plate back into place, and grabbed her hand. Rose put all the questions that conversation had raised away for some other time.

"Run?"

"Run."


End file.
